Content That Converts: How to Build a Profitable and Predictable B2B Content Marketing Strategy

by Laura Hanly

if people are to be expected to put up with turning on a computer to read a screen, they must be rewarded with deep and extremely up-to-date information that they can explore at will… They need an opportunity for personal involvement that goes far beyond that offered through the letters-to-the-editor pages of print magazines.” 1

The only way to make content marketing pay off is to develop a complete ecosystem around your primary content platform (whether that’s your blog, podcast, or YouTube channel),

To develop any successful marketing strategy, you need to have a clear picture of the goals in your business.

Here are some questions to ask yourself and your team in order to develop a marketing strategy that will serve your business: •What is the purpose of our marketing? •Who are we trying to reach? •What are the types of marketing we should use? Is content the right fit for us? •Do we have someone who can produce it? •Do we have good ideas about what our content would be focused on?

•Is our market segment interested in consuming that kind of content? •What other kinds of marketing do we need to implement to make our content really perform for us? •How will we measure success? •How long is our sales cycle? Can we absorb a delay between implementing this marketing strategy and having it start feeding into the sales cycle? •What operational adjustments will we need to make as the marketing becomes successful? •Who will be responsible for each part of the marketing strategy? •What resources will we need to execute the marketing strategy effectively?

two main types of content you can use in a content marketing strategy. The...

and there are conte...

this is the intersection between your expertise and what your customers want, what you want to

be an authority on, how you produce your best content, and your quarterly plan.

What is the intersection between what your customers want and/or need? What are the things you really, deeply care about in your business? What are you world class at, and how does that serve your customers? Maybe you believe you have the very best product in your niche and can defend that position. Maybe you go above and beyond for your customers in very tangible ways. Maybe innovation has allowed you to change your industry and is a critical part of how ...

What are your customers looking to you for insight about, and how do those topics overlap with the values you outlined above?

What do you want to be known as an industry authority for?

What is the one thing you can focus on becoming known for that will make it easier to develop, market and sell products that your audience will buy again and again?

The simplest way to become an authority on something is to say the same things about that topic over and over again.

What is the format in which you produce your best content?

it’s better to choose the format that you most enjoy working in, because if you like it, your audience will like it. For

show: it will engage your audience because it’s high energy, it will be focused, and it will address things they care about in a way that shows you care about it too.

What’s your quarterly plan?

in your quarterly plan: •A clear statement of your ‘one thing’ •Four themes you want to rotate through •Three topics per theme, including key points to touch on for each •Headlines for each topic (I recommend brainstorming a few variations so you can pick the best one) •Scheduled date of publication for each topic

remember that the people consuming it are people. They get distracted and tired. They get offended and hurt. They get excited and motivated. A little empathy goes a long way, particularly if you’re referring to specific people in your content.

Create your Conversion Quadrant: a.What do you value in your business, what do your customers value, and how do they intersect? b.What do you want to be the authority on? c.What format of content production works best for you? d.What’s the quarterly plan for your business, and what kind of content would best support those goals?

The Content Marketing

Ecosystem

There are two types of content ecosystems: recurring systems, and asset systems. A recurring system has six parts that need to be built in for the ecosystem to be healthy; an asset system has four parts.

The Six Parts of A Recurring Ecosystem

High-quality front end content

informative, actionable and interesting.

An opt-in offer

Good opt-in offers include white papers, industry reports, educational courses, cheat

sheets, checklists, webinars, video courses, coupons or demo/downloads.

3. An email onboardin...

A sequence is usually four to eight emails long, and educates the subscriber about your brand, shares some of your best resources, and invites them to connect with you.

4. An initial conversion opportunity

Once you’ve nurtured your leads for a while through your email sequence, providing them with lots of valuable information and sharing your expertise generously, it’s time to make them an offer.

A follow-up sequence

Those that did convert should a) be offered an upsell or upgrade and b) onboarded to make the most of the product or service they’ve purchased. Those that did not convert should be a) offered a downsell or ‘light’ version to try to get a conversion, and b) put into a new sequence that will give further value and education in preparation for the next offer (whether that’s the same thing offered in a new way, or an offer of a completely different product or service).

Another conversion opportunity (and another, and another…)

The Four Parts of An Asset Ecosystem

A high-quality long-form content asset

Content assets include books, web summits, webinar series, or mult...

An initial engagement opportunity

An initial conversion opportunity

A follow-up email sequence

It’s critical that there is a specific guiding principle for all your marketing. This principle or goal should direct all your decisions, make decision-making easier, and keep you focused on the right things

— otherwise it’s all too easy to get shiny-object syndrome and get completely derailed by focusing on tactics or tools that don’t actually serve

Pillar One: Simplicity

if you can’t explain it simply, you don’t

understand it well enough.

Who is reading this content? The owner of a B2B service business. •What is the specific problem they are trying to solve by reading it? Creating a consistent flow of qualified leads into their business. •What is the higher order consequence they want to achieve by reading this? Building a predictable stream of revenue and stability into their business (and, by proxy, the rest of their lives). •What is the precise solution you can deliver that helps them achieve that outcome? A step-by-step guide that shows them how to create content assets and systems that create traffic, capture leads and converts them into customers.

Pillar Three: Serendipity